Assignment: St. Petersburg » Dali Museum

Surreal Parade

Bob Horn — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 22:49:09 +0000

Yesterday morning, I took a break from the ‘work’ part of my job and opted to check out the Surreal Parade that was taking place to celebrate the official move from the original Dali Museum in its old warehouse building to the shiny, beautiful new $36 million dollar masterpiece on the waterfront next to Mahaffey Theater. I thought that I might catch an interesting photo or two for this blog, and I did. And, although some of my other photos are certainly more surreal by design, this shot was my favorite of the parade. As this formerly calm and peaceful horse walked down Third Street with Spanish Royalty riding in the carriage behind, it was suddenly spooked by some movement in the parade ahead, and it opted to register its concern with a couple of unplanned moves! After the jumping, there was a momentary, very sudden burst of forward speed, and then the driver was able to calm the horse down and resume a normal pace. But for a few seconds, it was pretty exciting to see! The small size of the photo here doesn’t do it justice, but if you click on it, you’ll get a larger image.

Anyway, there were hundreds of people who came out to watch the parade of Dali-esque beings who made the journey from old home to new. I’m not going to write about the details of the new museum – much better for you to get your information straight from the source, at the Dali Museum website. Rather, I’ve chosen to show you another parade image or two, as well as a shot of the front of the new Dali. It looks absolutely spectacular – I’m very excited to make my first visit!

Arts Alive: Free Museum Day for All in St. Petersburg!

Bob Horn — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 18:06:16 +0000

One week from tomorrow, on Saturday, September 25th, St. Petersburg residents will get the chance to experience Arts Alive Free Museum Day! St. Petersburg’s major museums will throw open their doors and welcome everyone in, free of charge! This will be the sixth annual event, done in coordination with the Smithsonian Institute and Smithsonian Magazine. The event is taking place in many major cities around the country, so if you’re not near St. Petersburg, be sure to check your local media for details in your area. But for St. Petersburg, I can tell you that you will be welcomed, at no cost, at the following great museums:

The Dali Museum
Dr. Carter G. Woodson Museum
Florida Holocaust Museum
Great Explorations Children’s Museum
Morean Arts Center and Hot Shop
Museum of Fine Arts
Pier Aquarium
St. Petersburg Museum of History

For more details, such as addresses, museum hours, description of current exhibitions, etc, you can check out this link on the City of St. Petersburg’s website.

And if you’d like a larger version of any of the photos shown here, just click on the individual image.

Well Hello, Dali!

Bob Horn — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 01:22:04 +0000

If you’ve never paid a visit to the Dali Museum, you really should! It’s a fantastic land of the surreal, and walking through the museum and really taking time to absorb what you see there can create entirely new neural pathways in your brain! Dali’s works are amazing, over the top explosions of color and shape and reality gone wild, and they are nothing but fun to see. Fans who live in the area or who visit here are very lucky – the St. Petersburg Dali museum holds the largest collection of Dali works in the United States and the largest collection outside of Europe.

For anyone who does not know Salvador Dali’s works, you can get a pretty good idea of what they’re about by checking out this Google Images site. And for those that do know Dali’s work, but are not familiar with all of the great things about the Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, you should check out the Museum’s web site. It’s worth looking at – aside from information about the exhibitions at the Museum, you can also learn about special events like the Saturday Family Fun Day and the S’Real Friday Happy Hour, with live music and half price admissions after 5:30 PM. Think about it – go to Happy Hour, have a couple of drinks, then walk around and take a look at some of the most mind-bending depictions of non-reality imaginable. Guaranteed to make your Happy Hour even happier. And, while you’re at it, you might make a new connection with someone else who’s attending – it’s a popular Friday evening event!

The Salvador Dali Museum is located at 1000 3rd Street South, just to the south of the University of South Florida’s Bayboro campus. For now.

And that leads us to the photograph below, and the really exciting news that I’m posting about. The Dali Museum will be moving, probably in 2011, if all goes according to plan. The new Dali home will be a 35 million dollar, 66,450 square foot structure – that’s twice the size of the existing museum! Included in the layout will be 50% more gallery space than the current museum has, which means that there will be a lot more of Dali’s work on display at any given time. The museum will feature a huge, futuristic looking glass geodesic structure, giving it a unique look and feel that should provide incredible visual impact in its setting on the waterfront and adjacent to the Mahaffey Theater.

As the building progresses, I’ll update this blog with new photos and more details. In the meantime, give yourself a treat and plan to spend some time at the existing Museum. I’m sure you’ll be glad you did…

New Dali Museum (Click for larger image)